[Dawn] Pakistain Foreign Office (FO) said Thursday that a dossier has been sent to the Afghan officials and International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) on the issue of Maulvi Fazlullah. The foreign office has also received response from them; it would be soon shared with the people, the FO added.

He congratulated the President of the United States Barrack Obama on his second time election in the White House. He said that the foreign office was in negotiations with the B.O. regime over the issue of drone attacks in Pakistain.

He said that Pakistain's policy has not been changed on the issue of US drone strikes in the country. The solution to the problem should be acceptable to the both parties.

[Tolo News] President Hamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... on Thursday criticised the structure of the United Nations...boodling on the grand scale... Security Council, saying at the 5th Bali Democracy Forum in Indonesia that it was not democratic.

Karzai said the UN Security Council cannot represent all of the world when the relationship between the Council and the UN General Assembly is not democratic.

"The Security Council does not represent all of us," Karzai told the forum in his address.

"The five permanent members of individual powers aren't democratic, the relationship between the Security Council and the General Assembly is not democratic  and of course we all wish it to be democratic. How do we get there? Afghanistan is too small and insignificant to make an impact, but we will talk. Democracy allows us that  the freedom of speech," he said.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also slammed the power of the council, citing the conflict in Syria.

He criticised its structure of only five individual countries holding veto powers and 10 non-permanent members with no veto power which meant the "fate of humanity" was in the hands of only five countries.

"If you leave the decision of the whole world to only five countries, it will eliminate the world. Conflicts between the UN structures have encouraged the Syrian regime to kill its people," he said. "It's a shame for all the globe to see dozens of people getting killed," he added.

Two of the veto five, China and Russia, have voted against resolutions for the UN to take action in Syria.

Iranian president Mahmood Ahmadinejad said in his address at the conference that the US election has turned into a "battleground for capitalists", pointing to the amount of money spent on running the election.

"An election, which is one of the manifestations of the people's will, has become a battleground for the capitalists, and an excuse for hefty spending," Ahmadinejad said a day after Barack ObamaIf you have a small business, you didn't build that... was re-elected as US president.

"Look at the situation in Europe and the US: elections should be democratic but only a number of wealthy people run for the election and spend millions to gain power and prevent the independent, honest and hard-working people from running for election," he said.

[Al Ahram] After a successful small surgery in Saudi Arabia, Sudan's president Bashir says he is in good health and his country's reaction to Israel will be painful after Khartoum accused it of bombing a military factory on 23 October

[Bangla Daily Star] West African army chiefs have adopted a military plan to expel beturbanned fascisti controlling northern Mali, as one krazed killer group pushes for a negotiated solution to the crisis.

Mali has slid into chaos since a March 22 coup overthrew the government of president Amadou Toumani Toure, creating a power vacuum that enabled beturbanned fascisti to seize the vast desert north.

[Al Ahram] Islamist groups - excluding Muslim Brotherhood and Al-Nour Party - to protest at Tahrir Square demanding the inclusion of Sharia as the main source of legislation in Egypt's new constitution

[Al Ahram] In her first official presentation to the U.N. security council, top persecutor Fatou Bensouda said Libya shouldn't grant amnesty for war crimes committed during the uprising against Gaddafi regardless of who committed them

[Bangla Daily Star] Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina...Bangla dynastic politician and current Prime Minister of Bangladesh. She has been the President of the Bangla Awami League since 1981. She is the eldest of five children of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founding father of Bangladesh. Her party defeated the BNP-led Four-Party Alliance in the 2008 parliamentary elections. She has once before held the office, from 1996 to 2001, when she was defeated in a landslide... yesterday said a vested quarter was out to thwart the trial of war criminals, and urged people to remain alert about their evil designs.

"I request all to remain alert so that the vested quarter cannot commit any destructive activities in the country," she said while inaugurating a conference at Bangabandhu International Conference Centre in the capital.

Mentioning about the recent violence carried out by the activists of Jamaat and Shibir across the country, the premier regretted that they even did not spare the law enforcers.

Hasina said the defeated force of the 1971 Liberation War was patronised by those who had killed Bangabandhu on August 15, 1975.

She mentioned that a particular person of the defeated force also got Bangladesh passport after he had been awarded Bangladesh citizenship.

"So, it is normal that someone will be there to save the war criminals who had committed crimes against humanity during the Liberation War," she told her audience.

[Jerusalem Post] Retired Turkish military commanders expressed fury that a former top Kurdish rebel was allowed to testify against them in a coup trial, citing it as proof the proceedings were meant only to intimidate and undermine the armed forces.

Semdin Sakik, known as "Fingerless Zeki" when number two in the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), waived his anonymity this week at the 'Ergenekon' conspiracy trial at which hundreds, including military, academics, businessmen and journalists, are accused of plotting to overthrow the Islamist-rooted government.

Opponents of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan say the trial of the alleged nationalist Ergenekon network and another plot for which hundreds of army officers were convicted in September are designed to silence the secularist opposition.

The appearance of Sakik, known as "Fingerless Zeki" since losing a thumb while firing a rocket, was a disturbing revelation for military leaders, who have fought for 28 years against the PKK - designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and European Union.

I wish there were a way to get the contents of the Turkish Archaeological Museum out of the way of the inevitable Salafist take-over. If I had the cash, I'd offer to buy what I suspect was the sarcophagus of Julian the Apostate.

[Al Ahram] Despite he said he had no intention of going to war with Syria, President Gul confirms Turkey is in talks with the NATO about deploying a defence system in the Turkish soil to counter a potential missile threat from Syria

[Dawn] Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... Governor Masood Kausar on Wednesday said no timeframe could be fixed for withdrawal of combat troops from Federally Administered Tribal Areas to peacetime position.

"I can't say anything about the timeframe to withdraw security forces from the fighting positions to peacetime positions as long as peace is not achieved in Afghanistan," he told news hounds at the conclusion of his two-day visit to Kurram Agency...home of an intricately interconnected web of poverty, ignorance, and religious fanaticism, where the laws of cause and effect are assumed to be suspended, conveniently located adjacent to Tora Bora...The governor said security forces would remain in Fata even after restoration of peace in tribal borderlands. He said there was instability in Afghanistan and its fallout was directly affecting nearby tribal areas.

Pakistain has over 100,000 army and paramilitary troops in Fata fighting militancy.

"I cannot give any date for the pull out of troops as well as return of the internally displaced persons to Fata," he said.

Mr Kausar said normality was returning to tribal agencies and IDPs were gradually returning home. He added that around two million people had been displaced in Fata.

He expressed satisfaction over the prevailing situation in Kurram Agency and said no major incident of violence had happened during the last two years in the valley.

He said political administration with the cooperation of elders would take more steps to keep Thall-Parachinar Road safe and secure for traffic. He said he was optimistic that Muharram would be observed peacefully in Kurram and Orakzai agencies and Kohat division.During interaction with the elders and other segments of the society in Parachinar, Kurram headquarters, Mr Kausar said the government could not maintain peace and stability unilaterally without the cooperation of local population.

[Dawn] Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Qamar Zaman Kaira on Thursday said that the government formed in 1990 was fake, assembly was bogus and termed all the decisions taken by that parliament illegal and unconstitutional.

Speaking to state-run Pakistan Television (PTV), Kaira said that all the unconstitutional decisions of the government formed through fraudulent elections are needed to be revisited.

He said that the Supreme Court verdict in the Asghar Khan case has proved that the 1990 government was formed as a result of stolen mandate.

The interim government set-up, which conducted the 1990 elections, rigged the elections through various tactics, he added.

The information minister said that the removal of elected governments through unconstitutional steps in the past had affected the national institutions.

However, the present government is trying its best to strengthen the democratic system, which had been weakened by the dictatorial regimes, he added.

Replying to a question, the minister said that the government had made the constitutional changes through the parliament and now the democracy can not be derailed.

Moreover, speaking to media representatives on the sidelines of a mass marriage ceremony in Kharian, the minister said that only people had the right to decide who would form the governments at center and provinces through their elected representatives and the judiciary had nothing to do with this process.

"General elections are due soon and the masses will hold the accountability of present rulers and elect their representatives for next five years", he added.

[Dawn] President of Quami Wattan Party and former federal minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao on Thursday said that the Awami National Party (ANP) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement...English: United National Movement, generally known as MQM, is the 3rd largest political party and the largest secular political party in Pakistain with particular strength in Sindh. From 1992 to 1999, the MQM was the target of the Pak Army's Operation Cleanup leaving thousands of urdu speaking civilians dead... (MQM) wanted an operation to take place in Bloody Karachi...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It may be the largest city in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... on the pretext of the notion that the Taliban were present in the city, DawnNews reported.

Speaking at a presser in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire., the former interior minister claimed that there was no Taliban presence in Bloody Karachi, adding that, the issue in the city was one of law and order.

Sherpao further said that certain individuals and groups were using the name of the Taliban to take extortion money.

He added that the ANP and the MQM were using the Taliban's name to play politics.

Sherpao moreover demanded of the government to carry out a transparent census in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), adding that, the government should take steps for the resettlement of the 800,000 people who had been displaced in the wake of military operations in the tribal areas.

On the re-election of US President Barack ObamaB.O.... , the former minister said that it would not bring any significant change with regards to the issues of peace and security in the region.

The apex court had issued a landmark short verdict on October 19 ordering legal proceedings against former head of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) General (Retd) Asad Durrani and former army chief General (Retd) Aslam Beg...occasionally incoherent retired four-star general who was the Chief of Army Staff of the Mighty Pak Army, succeeding the creepy General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, after the latter was rubbed out died in an air crash in 1988. The general was involved up to his hairy ears in the Mehran bank scandal, shuffling millions in public money to buy or lease politicians, and is believed one of the prime movers in the sale of Pak nuclear technology to Iran. He ranks second only to Hamid Gul in the volume and flavor of his anti-Western vitriol..They had allegedly bankrolled politicians to stop the current ruling Pakistain People's Party (PPP) from winning the 1990 election.

The verdict declares that both the accused former generals of the armed forces defamed their institution, adding that doling out money to a group of politicians was an individual act rather than of the institution itself.

The verdict also said that the duty of secret agencies was to protect the borders instead of forming election cells.

The diary of Brigadier (Retd) Hamid Saeed is also included in the detailed verdict which carries names of the politicians who received money and the amount they accepted.

Political cell, if any, of the President House should be abolished, stated the verdict, adding the then president, army and ISI chiefs unfairly used authorities bestowed upon them and also violated the constitution.

The court, in its short verdict, had directed the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to conduct a transparent criminal investigation against all the politicians involved and if sufficient evidence was collected, they should be sent for a trial according to the law.

[Dawn] The roars celebrating the re-election of US President Barack ObamaRepublicans can come along for the ride, but they've got to sit in the back... on television give Mohammad Rehman Khan a searing headache, as years of grief and anger come rushing back.

The 28-year-old Pak accuses the president of robbing him of his father, three brothers and a nephew, all killed in a dronezap a month after Obama first took office.

"The same person who attacked my home has gotten re-elected," he told Rooters in the capital, Islamabad, where he fled after the attack on his village in South Wazoo, one of several tribal areas near the Afghan border.

"Since yesterday, the pressure on my brain has increased. I remember all of the pain again."

In his re-election campaign, Obama gave no indication he would halt or alter the drone program, which he embraced in his first term to kill Al Qaeda and Talibs in Pakistain and Afghanistan without risking American lives.

Indonesian police said Friday that they would increase security checks on burqa-clad visitors at prisons in the capital after a convicted terrorist apparently escaped under the Islamic veil.

Roki Aprisdianto, 29, sentenced to six years behind bars in 2011, managed to escape undetected Tuesday from the Jakarta Police detention center  home to 70 terrorist inmates  when 23 burqa-clad women came to visit their husbands.

The convicted militant allegedly put on a burqa smuggled in by a visitor, said Jakarta police spokesman Col. Rikwanto. Another inmate told police he saw Aprisdianto wearing a burqa, but no one was recorded visiting him.

Police will staff additional female guards at prisons in Jakarta to conduct security checks in a closed room for women wearing burqas, said Rikwanto, who like many Indonesians uses one name. He said women previously were never asked to lift their veils.

From now on, all burqa-clad visitors who enter and leave the prison will be checked thoroughly, Rikwanto said. We dont want to neglect this again.

Police are still searching for Aprisdianto, who led a small terrorist cell and was arrested in 2010 for masterminding a series of bombings that targeted churches and police stations in Central Java province. There were no reports of injuries in the attacks.

[Ynet] French President Francois Hollande...the Socialist president of La Belle France, and a fine job he's doing of it... was quoted Thursday by French magazine Le Canard Enchainé as expressing regret that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "turned the Toulouse...lies on the banks of the River Garonne, half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea. The Toulouse metropolitan area is the fourth-largest in La Belle France... memorial into an election rally."

According to the report, Hollande said that he thought Netanyahu "was careful because I was there," adding that the Israeli PM was "Obsessed with Iran."

#2
An Englishman, a Frenchman and an American are out walking along the beach together one day. They come across a lantern and a genie pops out of it. "I will give you each one wish, " says the genie. The American says, "I am a farmer, my dad was a farmer, and my son will also farm. I want the land to be forever fertile in America." With a blink of the genie's eye, 'FOOM' - the land in America was forever made fertile for farming. The Frenchman was amazed, so he said, "I want a wall around France, so that no one can come into our precious country." Again, with a blink of the Genie's eye, 'POOF' - there was a huge wall around France. The Englishman asks, "I'm very curious. Please tell me more about this wall. The Genie explains, "Well, it's about 150 feet high, 50 feet thick and nothing can get in or out." The Englishman says, "Fill it up with water."

#3
Dogs turning on their owners GG.
Funny, everywhere you look, when the US tried to advance a culture so the folks weren't drinking shit water, the next generation resents it. I propose we should support(and in some cases, enable) the collapse of a society if the population votes for same. Of course it may take another generation to get the cave dwellers to understand socialization.

#4
My luck Tu would be while walking along the beach I found a bottle. Excitedly I rubbed the bottle and an angry Genie came forth from the bottle. I trembled and piddled myself as the Genie spoke in a booming voice,"at last!, I have lain in that bottle for two thousand years and now I am free. Now I shall destroy you". But, but what about my three wishes?. "Yes, for the first thousand years I would have granted you three wishes but I had lain in that bottle for another thousand years. I then swore I would destroy whomever released me". I then said(yes, I was able to speak)before I die, I just can't believe something so big and powerful could have come out of that bottle. "Foolish bug watch and learn", back into the bottle he goes and I closed the lid. Goodnight Irene. I thought I saw Harry Reid in the distance so I left it for him to find. Good deed for the day, well its the thought that counts.

"I hear babies cry...... I watch them grow
You know their gonna learn
A whole lot more than I'll never know
And I think to myself .....what a wonderful world
Yes I think to myself .......what a wonderful world."
Louis Armstrong

#11
JFM, I don't recall the french seizing much of anything in the last 100 years. How many foreigner soldiers died and are buried on their soil in a fight for their countries sovereignty from evil, real evil?

How easily the French remember their arrogance and quickly they forget their humility learned in history.

#15
Well said, Shipman. I did not post the article to trigger anti-France effusions, but just another datum of the world as it is today. Given that the French president is a Socialist, this kind of thing is only one of a sheaf of transgressions we can expect from him and his government -- our pity should go rather to JFM and the rest of the clear thinking Frenchmen and women who got outvoted and now are several months ahead of us on the distinct unhappiness curve.

[Al Ahram] Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-AssadHorror of Homs... on Thursday rejected calls that he seek a safe exit, vowing he would "live in Syria and die in Syria" in an interview with Russian-backed international channel RT.
"I am not a puppet. I was not made by the West to go to the West or to any other country," Assad, who is facing a nearly 20-month revolt against his rule, told the channel in English, according to transcripts posted on the state-backed Russian news channel's website.

"I am Syrian, I was made in Syria, I have to live in Syria and die in Syria," he said.

British Prime Minister David Cameron... has stated that he is certainly a big Thatcher fan, but I don't know whether that makes me a Thatcherite, which means he's not. Since he is not deeply ideological he lacks core principles and is easily led. He has been described as certainly not a Pitt, Elder or Younger, but he does wear a nice suit so maybe he's Beau Brummel ... on Tuesday floated the idea of granting Assad safe passage from the country, saying it "could be arranged" though he wanted the Syrian leader to face international justice.

Assad also warned against a foreign intervention to deal with Syria's escalating conflict, saying such a move would have global consequences and shake regional stability.

"We are the last stronghold of secularism and stability in the region... it will have a domino effect that will affect the world from the Atlantic to the Pacific," he said.

"I do not think the West is going (to intervene), but if they do so, nobody can tell what is next," Assad said.

In a separate video extract of the interview, Assad also said: "The price of this invasion, if it happens, is going to be big, more than the whole world can afford."

[An Nahar] Washington on Thursday unveiled sanctions against four Iranians and five Iranian bodies, including the communications minister and the culture ministry, for censoring the media and the Internet.

The move against Communications Minister Reza Taghipour came after he was blamed for ordering the jamming of international satellite TV broadcasts and restricting Internet access, a State Department official said.

The United States was determined to stop the "Iranian government from creating an 'electronic curtain' to cut Iranian citizens off from the rest of the world," said State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland.

All those placed under sanctions were "engaged in censorship or other activities that prohibit, limit or penalize freedom of expression or assembly by citizens of Iran," she added in a statement.

[An Nahar] Turkey's President Abdullah Gul said Thursday that the country reserved the right to defend itself against any threat from neighboring Syria, amid discussions about the possible deployment of U.S. Patriot missiles.

"Patriots... are being discussed within NATO...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis..... It is only natural for us to take any measure for defense reasons," Gul told news hounds, but insisted that it was "out of the question for Turkey to start a war with Syria.

And he also hoped that Syria would not act "illogically."

On Wednesday, Turkey said it is in talks with NATO over the possible deployment of Patriot missiles on its soil as part of contingency planning on the security of Turkey and NATO territories.

Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told news hounds in Brussels that it was only "normal" to discuss any defense measures in the face of potential risk from Syria.

Turkey has already beefed up border security with tanks and anti-aircraft batteries in the face of the deadly 20-month conflict in Syria, which has occasionally spilled over onto Turkish soil.

Turkish border units have systematically retaliated to cross-border shelling since Syrian fire killed five Turks on October 3.

A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.